POLITICAL SCIENCE.
undas. But a number of laws were made for its mitigation
or final extinction. In 1542, a law, prepared by a junta of
important men in Spain, and accepted by Charles V., pro-
vided among other things that " after the death of the con-
querors of the Indies the repartimientos of Indians which had
been given to them in encomienda in the name of his majesty,
should not pass in succession to their wives and children, but
should be placed immediately under the king, the said wives
and children receiving a certain portion of the usufruct for
their maintenance." Further, the men serving in a public
capacity who held such properties should be obliged to re-
nounce them. The encomiendas were now held in Peru for
the lives of the original owner and his son ; and it would seem
that the colonists had the impression that the grandson also
was to be included. When the new law was proclaimed it
created very serious disturbances in that province. After the
extinction of the rebellion the president, De la Gasca> framed
an act of repartition of property, the rents of which are
said to have been equal to the rental of a large part of Spain.
All the lands given out returned to the crown after two
lives.
In Mexico, Cortez made a provisional repartition, which was
set aside by that of an aitdicncia, and their doings again were
rectified by another. The law of succession (before 1542), at
length provided for the management of the encomiendas for
two lives and on a strictly feudal plan. But the complaints
of the colonists against parting with their properties led to the
prolongation by successive steps of the tenure of these estates
to three and five lives in Mexico. In Peru the tenure ended
and the properties reverted after the third generation. This
system remained in force until after the middle of the eight-
eenth century.
The compulsory services of the Indians \verc abolished,
after great efforts in Spain to do away with them, more than
a hundred years after the occupation. The Indians employed
in the mines were called Mitayos ; these also could not be
used in the service of individual colonists save for a time, and